Indescription
by volian
Summary: So what are you going to do when I'm gone? Oneshot, KubotaTokito.


INDESCRIPTION  
_fanfic by volly  
wild adapter (c) kazuya minekura_

..."So what are you going to do when I'm gone?"

He said it in a matter-of-fact, almost casual way, as if asking about the weather, slouched over the arm of the couch with his clawed right hand lying limply on the cushions. There was no use for a glove now. The fur was halfway up to his elbow, Kubota noticed, and took a long drag of his cigarette to buy time, trying to think of a suitable reply.

"What," he said at last, "makes you so sure you're going to die?"

It was a stupid, hopeless question and they both knew it. Tokito snorted and slid across the sofa, letting his body sprawl lazily over Kubota's lap. His half-smirk was cocky as usual, but there was a hunted look in his eyes. Feline eyes. The irises had already turned yellow, Kubota saw, and the pupils narrowed to slits. The eyes of an animal.

"Of course I will. Stop being in denial, you idiot, it's the most obvious thing in the world." He held up his left hand now, clicking the talons together for emphasis. "The point is, what are you going to do about it?"

Good question, Kubota mused. He rested a palm atop Tokito's tousled hair, fingers slowly combing through the dark strands still damp from the shower. Like petting a cat, stroking the lover who held his heart. Tokito's lids fell half-shut in contentment and Kubota couldn't help but wonder, morbidly, whether his pet would learn to purr before he was fully transformed.

He'd always accepted death. In some ways, he thought more highly of death than he did life. It was part of the reason he had dealt it out so often and so easily to so many, part of the reason why he was looking forward to the day of his own downfall. However...

"I don't want to see your end."

"Then you're a coward," Tokito hissed, golden eyes snapping open again, glaring into Kubota's eyes. Kubota tried to hold his cat's gaze, but it was so unnerving looking into the eyes of an animal from the face of the young man who had tamed him, and he was forced to turn away. "It's going to happen sooner or later, so you'd better make up your mind and tell me whether you're going to just stand there like a dumbass or do something about it!"

_Coward_. The accusation hung in the air like something poisonous. Kubota knew he was a coward. It had never bothered him much--nobody was stupid enough to call him that to his face but himself--

--to somebody else, so long ago. His first cat, he thought, and closed his eyes. But what could he do? Every murder site they've been to was clean of clues, of cures, of even a hint of the elusive drug but for the furred body on the floor. There were never any conspicuous prints on the pill bottles. The autopsy results never revealed anything helpful. Forensics were never any help at all. And there were always the other yakuza sniffing for W.A. out on the streets, slinking around alleyways and planting bugs in their apartment and otherwise dogging their every move...

"Kill me."

He opened his eyes to an animal glare and cat claws curling into his shirt. "You can do that, right? Kill me," Tokito repeated, talons slowly sinking through the cotton, just prickling Kubota's skin.

"You don't--" Kubota started, but then couldn't think of how to continue.

"I don't want to die--like that," Tokito jerked his head to where the W.A. papers lay on the table. He'd been reading them every day, Kubota remembered--sometimes with a dictionary by his side to help him out with the tougher words--studying every report as if there was an answer hidden in all the statistics and gory photographs.

"You don't want to die at all," Kubota said.

A soft, rueful laugh, as Tokito raised a hand up to Kubota's neck and hooked one claw over the collar of his top. "Does anybody?"

_Who knows_?

"But I want you to kill me," Tokito said seriously, and dragged the talon sharply downwards, easily slicing through the fabric and letting it fall open to bare Kubota's chest. "You've seen the others. Losing their minds, flipping out and murdering their friends before--before they fall apart. I don't want to kill you." Pressing one furred palm up against Kubota's chest, up against the heart, feeling the pulse acccelerate beneath the tips of his claws. "I want you to live."

_I want you to live_. Somebody else had said that to him, too. Komiya should never have been captured, should never have been killed, Kubota remembered thinking. He had been so energetic, so sincere, so full of life. How ironic it had been for a person like him to die before a man who could truly care less about living. How ironic that it should happen all over again.

"Promise me you'll live," Tokito said, his low whisper cracking into a hiss.

Kubota crushed his cigarette into an ashtray nearby. He really didn't feel like smoking right now. "Whatever you want," he said at last, watching silently as the wisps waned and died out. Cursing the words that tasted so bitter in his mouth. "But--"

_But why are you making me do this?_ was on the very tip of his tongue when he swallowed it down again. How had he become so petulant? He was always so like a child, his uncle had told him years ago, perpetually searching for entertainment. He had to admit, Tokito had been just another one of his toys at first, but then...

"Because," Tokito began, then hesitated.

_--because i don't want to die alone, because i don't want you to see me as one of those bodies we always hunted down, because i don't want you to forget me--_

"Because I trust that you'll do it."

"Yeah," Kubota murmured. _I'll do anything for you,_ went unsaid, they both knew it anyways. The edge of Kubota's mouth twitched, and Tokito reached up to kiss his sigh away, his fangs on Kubota's lips reminding him of the beast who lingered inside and stole away the cat's sanity second by second, day by day.

"Thanks."

...

The gunshot really resounded in his bones. But this time, as Tokito fell limply into his arms, Kubota felt nothing but emptiness. He pressed a last kiss to the other's lips and felt him try to smile.

_My cat died today. He had been surprisingly strong and full of life. That time, I was so sure I would be the first to die._

Just goes to show that I'm always wrong.

...

_author's notes_ - i was trying for heartbreaking but i think i failed horribly. :) just a warning. written for the ell-jay comm springkink (prompt: trust – "before your life just falls apart").

...myeah, it's just that. i'm a review whore. :( 'm sry, fleeing now, 'kay. 


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